Friday, 12 April 2013

DIGITAL WORDS / Here Is Your Temple "So High" EP Review

Swedish five piece who have a distinct way with shoegaze launch you into their alternate universe with their debut EP.

Giving Beach House a run for their money in the grown-up dream pop stakes, Swedish group Here Is Your Temple unleash a five track EP that can be assuredly filed between the aforementioned Baltimore twosome and French synth-poppers M83. Yet what sets Here Is Your Temple apart from their alt-pop contemporaries is that their sound is not so much geared towards inviting you to jump aboard a cloud of hazy ethereal calm, it’s more about pushing you down the rabbit hole.

Title track and debut single ‘So High’ is the prefect introduction to the darkened gloss of Here Is Your Temple’s sound as a brooding, thudding bass underlies an airy, synth hook as well as the androgynous, Patti Smtih-style vocals of singer Emily McWilliam.

As well as the nightmarish edge this EP exerts, a further additive to Here Is Your Temple’s shoegaze concoction are strong melodies which pay tribute to the soft rock of Fleetwood Mac, such as tracks like the deceptively pessimistic ‘Once Rich’ and the spaced-out acoustics of ‘Say Hey.’ Adeptly balancing and combining accessible pop phrases with broad cinematic soundscapes, So High is a tuneful trip that is waiting to take you away.